25 years ago this week — 2000

PENDLETON — Sidewalks in the southeast part of town are being improved to provide handicapped access.

Work began on the project last week that will replace 25 curbs along Southeast Byers and Court avenues between First Street and Stillman Park.

“Every year the city budgets money for handicapped accessibility,” said Public Works Director Jerry Odman. “We want to concentrate on areas that have high foot traffic for public events.”

Stillman and Brownfield parks along Byers are popular for community activities and the city wants to ensure access to everyone, Odman said.

About ten years ago, the city put in wheelchair-accessible sidewalk ramps along Southwest Court Avenue from Main Street to the Round-Up grounds.

The $18,000 project this year, contracted to J&J Custom Concrete Inc. of Pendleton, is funded through the city’s non-departmental budget, Odman said.

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UMATILLA — Beautiful, gorgeous, wonderful. Well-thought out. Great planning. Well built.

Descriptions of the latest luxury automobile? No. Descriptions of the latest cruise ship? Well, in a sense, yes, because that’s where Umatilla High School’s volleyball, basketball and wrestling teams are now setting sail.

Despite a few kinks – the facility opened later than planned – everyone at Umatilla High School seems elated. Their indoor sports teams are finally, finally, FINALLY using their new gymnasium.

The new gym is part of the new high school in Umatilla, which also opened late, with students starting class in late September. The new gym could be considered a new-millennium gym with its impressive, unique features. And it took until the new millennium to finally hold a sporting contest there.

“It’s pretty nice,” said Jodie Cleaver, a sophomore starting guard on the girls basketball team. “I was a little skeptical if we were going to get to play on it or not. But once league started, it happened and it’s nice to be out there.”

Cleaver’s team was the first to break in the new gym when the Vikings played The Dalles on Jan. 7. That was partly by design, Umatilla Athletic Director Chris Berry said. Because the volleyball team never has a chance to play in the new gym in the fall, the administration felt the girls basketball team should get to use the facility first.

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HERMISTON — Students at Rocky Heights Elementary School want an aquatic center, even if they have to raise the money one penny at a time.

The 505 children at the school spent the previous week collecting pennies from home, or from their neighbors, to raise funds for the aquatic center proposed near Hermiston Butte.

On Friday, the total came in at 440 pounds of pennies – the dollar amount hasn’t yet been determined, but it was enough to bring a smile to Kelly Sanders’ face/

“I think it’s wonderful that the children are leading the way and getting some funds,” he said.

Sanders is director of the Good Shepherd Community Health Foundation, which is coordinating the funds for the aquatic center.

The project culminated on Friday, the 100th day of the school year. Children milled around a scale outside, checking the weight of the pennies. Some students wore paper “glasses” in the shape of 100, with their eyes peering through the zeroes.

Event organizer Kathy Rhoads, a first-grade teacher, said the school will take the pennies to a bank this week and later present the foundation with a check to help pay for the aquatic center.

50 years ago this week — 1975

Five-year old Robin Petrik won’t be discharged from the University of Washington Hospital as soon as expected, her father, Robert Petrik, Pendleton, reported today. The girl, who received a kidney from her mother Jan. 22, is running a slight fever.

Robin is feeling so good “you could hardly believe it,” Petrik said, but the temperature, slightly higher than normal, has postponed her release from the hospital until later this week. He said the doctor “is confident a new antibiotic will whip it.”

Once discharged, Robin, whose infected kidneys were removed when she was 2, will stay at an apartment the Petriks have rented in Seattle. That will enable her to return to the hospital periodically for another two weeks. Then she should be able to return home.

“Kay is doing wonderfully,” Petrik reported of his wife.

“The fever was not very high — 99,” Petrik reported, “but it’s worrisome.”

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A vigorous Pacific storm buffeted the Oregon coast Tuesday night with winds up to 70 miles per hour, causing power outages in Lincoln City and blowing off roofs and breaking windows in Newport.

A Kernsville couple and their 4-year-old daughter escaped unharmed early today when a gust of wind leveled their houseboat on the Siletz River.

Owner Mark Greenlees said winds had bounced the houseboat around all evening, but the roof was anchored to the dock with quarter-inch cable.

Later, Greenlees said, the wind ripped off the roof in one section, then the walls caved in. He grabbed his daughter from her bed and broke a window so the three of them could crawl out.

Elsewhere, gusts up to 107 m.p.h. were recorded at Mt. Hebo Air Station in southern Tillamook County.

The storm caused scattered power outages in Lincoln City and repairmen were hammered by high winds, but all service was restored by 5 a.m.

Storm warnings continued along the north and central coasts today, but forecasters said winds gradually were dying. Only moderately brisk breezes and rain showers are expected inland through Thursday.

The storm also dumped quite a bit of water on northwest sections and kept temperatures mild throughout the state.

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A Stanfield woman says Union Pacific Railroad officials are making life miserable for her because she reported what may have been a crime at Hinkle.

But a UP official retorts that Elizabeth Brandt, 42, was scolded for stepping outside UP’s chain of command, not for reporting the incident.

Mrs. Brandt, who has worked two years in the kitchen of UP’s Hinkle Club, has been told by a Pendleton physician that the stress she is under has nearly given her an ulcer. She has been placed on 30-day sick leave by the physician.

Umatilla County Dist. Atty. Jack Olsen says he is “shocked” by UP’s attitude. “We try to encourage people to report crime,” he said. “We do all we can to get citizen involvement. I am shocked and dismayed” by UP’s scolding of Mrs. Brandt.

Mrs. Brandt gives this account:

Last Dec. 25, Mrs. Brandt, mother of four children and twice a grandmother, was told by a maid at the Hinkle Club about a strange, strong odor outside one of the rooms. The club, which has hotel and restaurant facilities, is only for UP employes.

The hour was 9:40 p.m. and Mrs. Brandt’s boss, W. A. Reasonover, has retired to his apartment at the club.

So Mrs. Brandt called UP Special Agent Dean Whitely. Whitely in turn called in support from the Oregon State Police office at Hermiston.

So, what’s the problem?

Well, two days after Mrs. Brandt reported the odd smell to agent Whitely, a UP official in Denver chided her for not following the chain of command. Mrs. Brandt says she is being harassed by UP officials in her department and by fellow workers. She said she had received four public reprimands for reporting the incident to Whiteley instead of Reasonover.

100 years ago this week — 1925

HERMISTON, Feb. 10. — Horse heaven as a haven for horses and the Switzler branding iron are passing into the romantic history of the old west. The iron has been sold, shambles have been built and day after day a band is being driven into the old corral to follow the leader out no more to the bunch grass paradise.

Floyd King and others several days ago bought 750 head of Bill Switzler for $3,50 per head. The animals will be slaughtered for their hides and by-products. The flesh will be cooked from the bones and fed with a mixture of grain to hogs and the cleaned bones will be shipped to San Francisco for use in sugar refineries. Mr. King expects to buy and kill about 2000 head at his new yards at Plymouth just across the river from Umatilla.

Ever since Umatilla was a town in the fifties the name of Switzler has been associated with it and nearly as long has J. B. Switzler, recently deceased, and his son William Switzler, owned large bands of horses that ranged the Horse Heaven hills. Ever since the Round-Up was started a band of these wild bronchos were shipped each year to Pendleton for the wild horse race. Any traveler crossing the Great Outdoors of the Horse Heaven always could see these wild animals in their natural habitat.

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A big Mallet engine was put crosswise on the main track of the O. W. R. & N. near Thornhollow this morning at 3 o’clock when an eastbound freight train ran into a loose rail and a pile of ties that had been placed on the track. Conductor Baxter is in St. Anthony’s hospital suffering from minor injuries, and traffic has been held up for 12 hours as a result of the wreck.

The wreck is reported to have been caused by the loosening of the rail and the placing of the ties on the track, but the identity of the perpetrators of the act is not known. A number of hoboes were kicked off of passenger train No. 18 here yesterday afternoon, and some of them are reported to have got back on the train as it pulled out of the yards. The hoboes are suspected of being implicated in the wreck.

Two eastbound passenger trains were held in the local yards during the day, No. 24 and No. 6. A wrecking crew went to the scene of the wreck early this morning and started work in clearing the track.

The big engine did not turn over and to this good fortune is ascribed the fact that neither the engineer or fireman was hurt. The conductor was in his bunk in the caboose and was thrown out when the train came to an abrupt stop, but his injuries are said to have been minor.

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Harvey Strong, 17, an Indian who claims his home is in Toppenish, Washington, is in the county jail, and a search in Toppenish is being made for another Indian youth named Sam Frank on a charge of placing obstructions on the track of the O. W. R. & N. that caused a wreck of a freight train Thursday morning.

The arrest of young Strong and the subsequent confession which officers claim to have secured from him resulted from work done cooperatively by members of the sheriff’s office and special officers of the railroad company. Strong at first denied any responsibility for the wreck, but later after being questioned by the group of officers, his story was torn to pieces and he admitted that he and his chum blocked a switch and caused the engine to leave the track.

The youth gave no reason for his action.

Close observation by Deputy Sheriff Bennett of peculiarities of the imprint of Strong shoes was the entering wedge that enabled officers to break down the Indian’s alibi. He said that young Frank helped him in the work.

Two obstructions were used, Strong’s story indicated. The switch was blocked at Cayuse, and west of Cayuse an old tie and a fence post were put on the track.